Paparazzi
by RogueWriter17
Summary: Riley expected keeping her secret to be the hardest part when she poses undercover as a WWE Diva to score a story. Being thrown into the middle of a romantic storyline and deciding where her loyalties lie was never part of the equation. John/OC/Cody
1. Prologue

**A/N:** Ok. So this is my first story up here on and it is based off the WWE. It's my first story so please be nice, I know it isn't perfect but I hope that it's good enough to grow even a few fans. So leave me a review if you like it, or even if you don't, but just be gentle please. I'm fragile. This only the prologue and it's only here basically to introduce my OC Riley to you guys and kick start the real story.

**Disclaimer:** I own nothing but the plot, and any OC's of mine that I have thrown into this story.

**Paparazzi**

By, RogueWriter17

Chapter: Prologue

"Massaro? Where is she?"

I gasped and quickly shoved my chair away from underneath me and ducked away to disappear underneath my desk just as the door to my office swung open and I heard it pound against my wall rattling the framed items tacked up onto them. I was seriously beginning to wonder if this dude had ever heard of knocking before.

"I saw you," he said in a terse tone.

Sighing, I reluctantly crawled back up onto my knees so that my head poked over the surface of my junk-cluttered desk. "Harry? Hi, I was just… looking for my contact lense," I lied, patting my hand around on my carpet looking pretending to search for the nonexistent object.

"Riley?" he asked.

"Yeah, Boss?"

"You're wearing glasses."

Dammit.

"Um…" I struggled to come up with my next move. I scoffed and pretended to be offended. "A girl can't try to switch things up every twenty-two years." I emphasized my point with another scoff as I pushed myself back up onto my feet. "It's that kind of attitude that kept women from voting during the eighteenth century, mister."

"Can it, Massaro and take a seat," he ordered. I quickly and obediently did what he asked as he closed the door to my office, separating me from any witnesses before he stalked over to stand before my desk and tossed a stack of white papers onto my keyboard. "What is this crap?" he demanded, stabbing a finger in the direction of the file.

I craned my neck to look at the title of the document and instantly recognized it to be my latest article. "Um… my latest article?" My voice wavered so much that it came out as a question.

"No, that is dozen loyal readers tossing our sports magazine into the trash at the first sighting of that crap. Cheerleading, Massaro, seriously?" he inquired, giving me a dumbfounded look. Okay, so maybe doing a piece on the art of cheerleading for a magazine where men made of seventy-five percent of its fan base wasn't one of my better ideas.

"I was a cheerleader in high school, Harry," I replied knitting my plucked brown eyebrows at him.

"When you strolled in here for the first time looking for a job a year ago," Harry continued as if I hadn't even spoken. "I was a little skeptical about hiring a girl to do reporting on sports, but you promised to work diligently and meet deadlines—which you always have—and you being easy on the eyes tipped the scales in your favor a little as well." I scoffed which he ignored. "But this is not the type of work I'm looking for here, Riley. Your first few articles have been fair, but you haven't given me anything to really wow our readers, and now you give me this crap!" he said, waving a hand in the direction of my unacceptable article. "It seems to me like instead of improving, you're moving in the opposite direction. Maybe Train Magazine isn't the right place for you—I'm sure _In Style_ however…"

I wasn't until the middle of his lecture that I realized what he was getting at and my jaw dropped. "Are-are you firing me, Harry?" I asked in disbelief. I'd been working here for two years now; Train Magazine was all I knew, and getting fired from a place like this wasn't going to help me get picked up by _Sports Illustrated_ anytime soon.

"I'm sorry, Riley. I'll give you till the end of the week to finish cleaning your stuff out." With that, he walked out of my office. I stood there, frozen where I stood until I heard the door close behind me and my entire body shivered. I was unemployed. How would I eat? How was I supposed to pay my bills? Oh, god. I'm going to have to move back in with my parents!

Glancing around my office, looking at the antique bookshelf shoved against the wall that was lined with books all related to today's sports world, and my beige walls that were lined with photos of famous magazine and newspaper icons, as well as my bachelors' degree in Journalism I'd received when I graduated top of my class from Princeton. Everything I had in my arsenal destined me for greatness, yet I couldn't deliver at a job working for a low-budget sports rag? Four years, and thousands of dollars I threw away attending Princeton gone down the drains.

Wiping away the hot tear rolling down my cheek with my index finger, I took in a breath and collected my purse before I made my way out of my office, closing the door softly behind me. I'd come back later with my dad and brother to start gathering my things. I wasn't ready to face that embarrassment of having my fellow all-male coworkers watch me fail like they'd all anticipated I would as we carried my things out in large brown boxes.

I slide slowly into my car before I stabbed my key into the ignition and started off in the direction of the condo I shared with my only sister, Ashley and her daughter. My sister had always—and probably will always be—been the first person I went to whenever something awful happened to me. If I couldn't tell Ashley, then I wouldn't talk to anyone about it. We had this bond that just made it impossible for me to share things with other, even my closes friends, before I shared them with my sister.

When I stepped into the condo thirty agonizing minutes of me trying to force the tears away later, I found Ashley and Lexi sitting on the couch in the living room, both their eyes glued to the television. I'm guessing that it was Lexi's SpongeBob Square Pants time. I'm pretty sure that they hadn't even heard me enter the condo. Sighing softly, I decided to leave them be and just go into my room and hide away from the world underneath my pillows and act like the big failure that I am.

"Hey, Ry," I heard Ashley call to me one I was beginning to make my way towards the hall. I forced a soft smile onto my face and turned around to face her and Lexi who were both now watching me.

"Hey guys. How was school today, Lexi?" I asked, trying to keep my voice from breaking.

"Billy Borelli spilled glue onto my math homework – so I punched him," she replied easily with a shrug before turning back to the television.

"Oh, that's right," Ashley said tapping the eight-year-old lightly on her back. "You're grounded, missy. To your room."

"But, Mom," Lexi began to protest.

"You can come out when you realize that violence is never the answer. Now go." I couldn't help but giggle at the identical stubbornness of the mother-daughter duo as Lexi stormed out of the room in a huff and stalked away down the hall into her bedroom. I then turned back to Ashley who sighed and turned off the television. "Kids today, girl. Teacher told me that she broke the poor kid's nose – I'm so proud of her!"

Now I nearly doubled over with laughter. "Only a Massaro could be proud of her daughter punching out some other kid," I giggled as I walked over to plop down into the empty space beside her that was still warm from Lexi being here.

"Oh no, the big plop and squat," Ashley mooned. She tucked both her legs up onto the sofa and turned to face me. "What's wrong?"

"Why does something have to be wrong?" I replied trying my best to put on what I hoped to be a secure expression.

Ashley didn't appear to be fooled. "Seriously; out with it."

"All right fine," I huffed. "I got fired today."

"What?" she cried instantly jumping up. "Why? What happened?"

"From Harry's perspective, my article would have lost us more readers than it would have gained. Maybe he's right though. I was working in an environment that just wasn't right for me. Train is a men's magazine; I was way out of my element."

"And televised wrestling was once considered a male sport, but then people like Fabulous Moolah, Sensational Sherrie and, heck, even Trish Stratus! They all came along and broke the status quo for women to make it in the WWE and other wrestling industries across the world!"

One thing about Ashley, she was a big wrestling buff, like nearly everyone else in my family besides my mom and I. Even though she didn't work for the company anymore, she still watched that WWE show that came on Monday nights every week she could.

"Well that's not going to help me, Ash!" I groaned. "To convince Harry that I'm worth anything to the business I need a kick ass story and I need it, like, soon." I moaned as I slapped my palm onto my forehead and dragged it down my face. I am so unemployed.

I noticed then that Ashley had gotten quiet for a moment, and with Ashley Marie Massaro, quiet was never a good thing. I removed my hand from my face and turned to Ashley who now had this big, sneaky grin on her face, which, again, with Ashley, was never a good thing.

"What are you thinking?" I inquired, not sure I'd like what came from her mouth next.

She turned and directed her smirk at me. "If it's a story they want, then it's a story they'll get you."

I'm sure my expression was as confused as I felt. "You lost me," I admitted.

"I need to call in a quick favor but first I have a question – How do you feel about doing a little undercover work?"

I eyed her curiously, wondering just what she meant. Little did I know that that question was the start of a plan that I never thought I'd be able to pull off in a million years.


	2. Every Beginning Starts With A B

**A/N:**Ok. So this is my first story up here on and it is based off the WWE. It's my first story so please be nice, I know it isn't perfect but I hope that it's good enough to grow even a few fans. So leave me a review if you like it, or even if you don't, but just be gentle please. I'm fragile. This only the prologue and it's only here basically to introduce my OC Riley to you guys and kick start the real story.

**Disclaimer:**I own nothing but the plot, and any OC's of mine that I have thrown into this story.

_**Paparazzi**_

By, RogueWriter17

Chapter 1: Every Beginning Starts With A B

My back slammed hard against the mat and I instantly felt the wind being knocked straight out of me. That stupid job wasn't worth this kind of torture.

I coughed and sputtered, struggling to catch my breath as I rolled over onto my stomach, my brown locks falling directly into my face. We'd been at this every day for three weeks straight now, and I still felt as if I hadn't gotten the slightest bit better. I mean sure there were some things I was getting the hang of, but most of the stratageys Ashley attempted to teach were just lost upon me. Also, we still hadn't heard anything from this contact that Ashley had who was supposed to be setting this whole plan into motion. I still couldn't believe that Ashley was cool with me doing this, and had actually suggested it in the first place.

"I—"cough, cough—"quit!" I shouted, slowly pushing myself up onto my knees using my hands. Ashley stood leaning up against the ropes across the ring, watching me with an amused look on her face.

"That's cool, I'll just kick you out when you miss the rent and you can move back in with mom and dad and live off of food stamps." I shuddered at the thought of that. I love my parents dearly, but living with them ever again was out of the question.

"That was low," I hissed at her, forcing myself shakily back to my feet.

"I know, but it isn't as hard as you're making it, Riley. I'm taking it easy on you right now 'cause you're my sister; the other girls in the industry aren't related to you by blood. They're ruthless, and they'll kick the shit out of you at any sign of weakness," she told me, thrusting herself off the ropes. "Now, do you want to try again or just call it a day?"

I sighed and shook my head. "No, lets try it again—what is it again?"

"It's called a clothesline. It's when your opponent runs at you with their arm outstretched and catches you by the throat. It hurts like hell if you're on the receiving end but pretty easy to avoid if you time it right. You ready?" I nodded, though still unsure and she charged. Remembering my cheerleading roots from high school I came up with a brilliant idea.

I watched as she charged, waiting, the finally, at just the right moment, I feel down to the mat in a split and rolled out so that I was now halfway across the ring giving me both enough time to recover and space from my opponent to decide what to do next.

Ashley grabbed onto the ropes to stop her momentum before she turned back to me, smiling brilliantly. "Finally!"

"OK," I wheezed. "Now we can take a break."

"Agreed," Ashley said with a nod as we both rolled underneath the ropes and rested on the apron, dangling our legs over the side.

"Ash?"

"Yeah?"

"Are you sure that you're cool with me doing this? I mean you watch Raw nearly every week, and you used to work for the company. Aren't you fighting with your loyalties or anything like that?" I wondered. This had been bugging me since we started my training two weeks ago. I didn't want to do this if it made her uncomfortable.

She wrapped an arm around me and shook her head. "My first loyalties go to my family. And a reporter going undercover in the WWE is the best way to make a name for yourself. When you're done with this, you could possibly even publish your own book instead of going back to that crappy job with _Train_."

She did have a point. People would pay big money for a story based upon what truly goes down behind the curtain in the WWE. Ashley had told me numerous stories about all the taboo things that had happened with the other talent when she was still working for the company, and some of the things she'd told me were unbelievably delicious. This book was a New York Times Bestseller waiting to be written, screw Harry and that fucking job with _Train_ magazine.

"So, when's this contact of your supposed to be calling us back?" I wondered. "It's been like three weeks now."

"Chill out, it'll get here when it gets here."

I frowned in confusion. "It?"

"Come on, I think we've done enough training for one day. Lets go back home so I can get ready to go pick Lexi up from school."

I nodded and we both hopped down from the apron before heading exiting the gym to climb into Ashley's car—sweaty and icky I might add—and back to the condo to shower and change. Once I'd finished showering and switching into something a little less comfortable than exercise clothing, Ashley was already gone to pick up Lexi.

I continued down the hall into the living room to make my way over into the kitchen to grab a quick snack as I just realized that all that getting smacked around inside the ring has made me extremely hungry. As I was passing the couch, however, I noticed the little red button on the phone cradle was blinking signaling that we had a voicemail. I'd forgotten to check it today.

There were a few messages from friends—both mine and Ashley's—and one from our mother. Just as I was about to walk away into the kitchen, another message started playing, this one from someone I wasn't familiar with.

"Hello my name is Stephanie McMahon and I'm calling on behalf of World Wrestling Entertainment. I'm calling for Riley Massaro. I recently received a phone call as well as a very impressive audition video of your in-ring skills from you Sister Ashley who has done nothing but spoken the best of you. Miss Massaro I must say that I am very impressed and I would love to have a meeting with you sometime very soon in the near future. If you could call me at my office and we can maybe set up a meeting sometime this week…"

The rest of the message after that I could bring myself to remember anything but the screaming, not from Stephanie but from me. Somehow I'd begun screaming my head off and jumping around the room like an idiot. I wasn't exactly sure as to why I was so excited about Stephanie wanting to meet with me; I didn't even like wrestling. Maybe it was just the possibility that my dreaming of achieving bestseller-list status was now getting a little bit closer.

As soon as the message ended I snatched up the phone and dialed Stephanie back from the number in the phone's memory. It rang an unbearable three times before finally I heard a familiar voice of Stephanie McMahon herself—I felt like I was talking to royalty as this chick's family had more money that God almost.

"Stephanie McMahon," she answered in her generic business tone.

"Um… Mrs. McMahon?" Shit. My voice was quivering. How pathetic.

"Yes, can I help you?" she asked, her tone sounded a little bored. Maybe I got a little ahead of myself. I should probably have waited until Ashley got back.

"Y-yes, hi, my name is Riley Massaro. You called me earlier?"

"Ah, yes, Riley!" her tone seemed to perk up and I felt myself relax, but only a little. "I'm glad that you received my message. I received your audition tape as well as a call from your sister a littler earlier this week, and as I mentioned before, she spoke nothing but the best of your abilities. Now, I'm sure you'll need much more training but I'm a strong believer in the what-you-see-is-what-you-get theory and from the looks of your audition tape you have strong promise and I would like to offer you a spot in our Divas division. Between you and me, we need some fresh new faces around." I laughed. I'd expected her to come across as more of an ice princess like I remember on television when Ashley used to watch it when we were younger, but she was actually kind of funny. "So, I'll be in New York on business this Friday. Could we set up a meeting on that date?"

"Yes," I blurted out before the words had even fully exited her mouth. "I mean, sure, I think I can make that work."

Stephanie giggled light-heartedly before we both said our goodbyes with promises to see each other soon and hung up. Not even ten minutes later Lexi came running into the house, she instantly dumped her Dora the Explorer backpack off by the door and ran over to jump onto the couch in front of the television. "Hi, Aunt Riley!" she greeted me with a grin before he attention returned to the flashing screen.

"Alexis Massaro you are still… oh forget it," Ashley moaned waving a hand at the subject of Lexi's grounding as she closed the door behind her. "What are you beaming about over there?" she asked, noticing my Cheshire cat-like smile.

"Oh nothing," I replied innocently as I strolled away into the kitchen and began digging around through the refrigerator. I retrieved a jar of pickles and placed it atop the counter. "But if you must know, I just got the phone with none other than the Stephanie McMahon—"

"What?" Ashley gasped dashing up beside me into the kitchen. "She finally called back? What did she say?"

"Nothing much—hey, how are you? How's Lexi? And she may have mentioned something about meeting with me this Friday so we can discuss my future with the industry!" Ashley and I both squealed in union before she pulled me into a hug.

"Oh, my god, I am so proud of you! We have to call mom and dad!" she insisted.

That caused my excitement to quickly vanish. What would I tell them when they asked about my sudden interest in wrestling? I couldn't lie to my own parents, and if I told them the truth they'd try to talk me out of it.

"What's wrong?" Ashley asked, a concerned look covering her face.

"What are we supposed to tell them, Ash?" I inquired, shaking my head. "That I'm scamming the WWE into thinking that I actually want to become a Diva when actually I'm an undercover reporter looking to extort what happens inside their company in hopes of furthering my own true career. Yeah, they'll love that." By now any form of excitement that I had about this interview was long gone and replaced with disgrace. Was this really something that I wanted to carry through with? "I just don't think that I can deal with all the lies and deceit."

"Right, you're the one in the family with principals," Ashley sighed. Was that supposed to be an insult? "Look, Riley. I know that you made all these promises when you first started your journalism career to never become like the sleazy paparazzi that you see today doing anything to get a story, but this is a once in a lifetime chance here. You could turn this experience into a book and make millions, most of which I'm sure your conscience will propel you to donate to charity so if you look at it, you're actually helping people by going through with this." Wow, since when did Ashley become the insightful one out of the two of us? "So maybe you'll step on a few toes when it's all over, you can't make friend everywhere you go, Ry."

Deep down, I knew that she was right. About both things. This was a opportunity that most people in my position would kill for, and I would be a fool to let something like this slip right through my fingers.

"Okay," I conceded. "I'll do it."


End file.
